December 03, 2019 10:59 AM UTC

Get More Smarter on Tuesday (December 3)

• 6 Comments
• by: Colorado Pols

There are 21 shopping days left until Christmas; you may officially begin to panic. In the meantime, let’s Get More Smarter. If you think we missed something important, please include the link in the comments below (here’s a good example). If you are more of an audio/visual learner, check out The Get More Smarter Show or The Get More Smarter Podcast. And don’t forget to find us on Facebook and Twitter.

TOP OF MIND TODAY…

► President Trump was talking to reporters in London today alongside French President Emmanuel Macron when he announced that there is no end in sight to his trade war with China. You could literally watch the Dow Jones tick downward as Trump was speaking. From CNBC:

U.S. equities sank on Tuesday after President Donald Trump suggested he may want to delay a trade deal with China until after the 2020 presidential election.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell more than 400 points in morning trading, led lower by trade-vulnerable Apple, Caterpillar and Boeing. The S&P 500 slid 1% amid losses in chip stocks like Nvidia, Micron and Advanced Micro Devices. The Nasdaq Composite lost more than 1%…

…“In some ways, I like the idea of waiting until after the election for the China deal, but they want to make a deal now and we will see whether or not the deal is going to be right,” Trump told reporters earlier on Tuesday.

When asked if he had a deal deadline, he added: “I have no deadline, no … In some ways, I think it is better to wait until after the election if you want to know the truth.”

When informed about the damage inflicted by his comments, Trump later told reporters that he “doesn’t watch the stock market,” which is pretty silly.

Trump: “I don’t watch the stock market”. pic.twitter.com/QMF40KEZPj

— Sven Henrich (@NorthmanTrader) December 3, 2019

► As The Washington Post reports, President Trump made sure to hurt American diplomacy as much as he was harming the stock market today:

President Trump on Tuesday slammed as “very, very nasty” and “very disrespectful” recent comments by his French counterpart about the diminished state of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization alliance.

Referring to comments President Emmanuel Macron made last month in an interview with the Economist magazine — in which Macron described the “brain death” of NATO resulting from America’s failure to consult with its allies — Trump attacked Macron on the first day of the NATO 70th anniversary summit in London, calling the comments “very insulting.”

“You just can’t go around making statements like that about NATO,” Trump said, sitting next to NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg at a one-on-one meeting between the two leaders Tuesday morning. Though Trump himself has long been a vocal critic of NATO — a combative stance that has alarmed Western allies and seemed to prompt Macron’s comments — Trump took umbrage at the French assessment of the alliance, and he depicted France as the beneficiary of American largesse.

Macron, for his part, was fact-checking Trump in real time as the discussion unfolded in front of reporters.

► The House Intelligence Committee will likely vote today to move its impeachment inquiry report to the House Judiciary Committee as the latter prepares to begin drawing up articles of impeachment.

► “Nuh-uh!” That’s essentially what House Republicans are saying in their latest defense of President Trump. As Politico reports:

According to a draft copy of the GOP’s formal rebuttal, Republicans will assert that Democrats failed to unearth evidence that Trump committed impeachable offenses when he asked Ukraine’s president to investigate former Vice President Joe Biden.

The Republicans’ 123-page report largely reiterates their previous defenses of the president and blasts House Democrats for pursuing impeachment, painting the effort as an attempt to reverse the results of the 2016 presidential election. The report forms the basis of their response to allegations that Trump abused his power to solicit foreign assistance in the 2020 election…

…House Intelligence Chairman Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) dismissed the GOP report’s conclusions as “intended for an audience of one,” and said it “ignores the voluminous evidence” against the president.

In response to Schiff’s comments, House Republicans declared, “I know you are, but what am I?”

The Denver Post, meanwhile, has more on how two Colorado Congressmen are about to take a center stage in the impeachment inquiry.

► Check out this week’s episode of The Get More Smarter Podcast, with Alan Franklin filling in for Ian Silverii and Jason Bane filling in for dead air.

Get even more smarter after the jump…

IN CASE YOU ARE STANDING NEAR A WATER COOLER…

► As Diane Carman writes for the Colorado Sun, Democratic Senate candidate Andrew Romanoff may have more trouble getting away from his policy past than he would like you to believe:

Here in Colorado, it’s Andrew Romanoff who’s apologizing … as he has been for most of the last 13 years.

The former Speaker of the House could have thumbed his nose at Bill Owens in 2006 when the governor called the Legislature into special session during a period of heated debate over immigration reform across the country.

In retrospect, Romanoff has said, that’s exactly what he should have done.

Instead, he led the effort to forge a compromise that produced one of the toughest anti-immigration programs in the country at the time…

…Romanoff has struggled with this legacy in previous unsuccessful campaigns and recently told The Colorado Sun that it was a mistake and, if voters are “holding out for a candidate who’s never made a mistake, they probably won’t cast many votes.”

Fair enough, but the whole episode highlights an important aspect of politics in 2020 and beyond.

That lesson, writes Carman, is that voters may forgive but rarely forget.

► The Presidential campaign of California Sen. Kamala Harris is sinking like the stock market during a Trump speech. Harris is dropping out of the race for the Democratic Presidential nomination.

► A federal appeals court declined to block Congressional efforts to access President Trump’s financial records citing a “public interest” in the query. Maybe we’ll soon get to figure out the margins on all that Trump crap being sold online.

► As Axios explains, President Trump is writing a lot of checks that he may not want to be cashed in the event of a Senate impeachment trial:

Trump said in a press conference on Tuesday that he would like Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, acting Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney, Secretary of Energy Rick Perry and “many other people” to testify in a Senate trial if the House votes to approve articles of impeachment.

Pompeo, Mulvaney, and Perry were all subpoenaed to testify in front of the House Intelligence Committee but refused to cooperate.

► Senator Cory Gardner (R-Yuma) has not held a public town hall meeting in Colorado in more than two years. Senator Michael Bennet (D-Denver) held a town hall meeting last Friday.

► There’s more bad news about the Bureau of Land Management’s big move to Grand Junction: Federal workers are getting pay cuts as a result of Sen. Cory Gardner’s pet project. 

► Republican Sen. Mitt Romney says there is no evidence that Ukraine tried to interfere in U.S. elections in 2016. Perhaps Romney can talk some sense into Louisiana Republican Sen. John Kennedy, who alleged without evidence over the weekend that Ukraine’s former President was literally working with Democrat Hillary Clinton’s Presidential campaign. 

David Hale, the State Department’s #3 official, told members of a Senate Foreign Relations Committee on Tuesday that he was unaware of any evidence indicating that Ukraine interfered in the 2016 election. Via Politico:

“Are you aware of any evidence that Ukraine interfered in the 2016 U.S. election?” Menendez continued, to which Hale responded: “I am not.”

► Former Congressman Mike Coffman officially became the newest Mayor of Aurora on Monday. 

► A North Dakota company that President Trump personally touted as an option for a wall-building job has — SURPRISE! — been awarded a $400 million contract.

► The Associated Press reports on another school shooting:

An armed student confronted a school resource officer at a Wisconsin high school Tuesday morning and both were wounded, police said, in the second such shooting at a school in the state in as many days.

The latest shooting happened at Oshkosh West High School just after 9 a.m., Oshkosh police spokeswoman Katherine Mann said at a news briefing. The student and the officer were taken to hospitals, but no one else was injured in the shooting, Mann said…

…Tuesday’s shooting in Oshkosh, a city of about 67,000 people, was about 80 miles (130 kilometers) north of Monday’s shooting in the Milwaukee suburb of Waukesha. A police officer responding to a situation at Waukesha South High School shot an armed male student in a classroom. Officials say that student pointed a handgun at officers. The 17-year-old boy was wounded and is in custody in stable condition. No officers or other students were injured, Waukesha Police Chief Russell Jack said.

► As the Grand Junction Sentinel reports, the Solar Investment Tax Credit is about to be phased out of existence if lawmakers don’t take action. Elsewhere, state regulators are being pushed to move ahead with changes that could increase the number of community solar projects in Colorado. 

Your Daily Dose Of ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 

► At least Texas Republican Rep. Randy Weber isn’t your Congressional representative.

► First Lady Melania Trump has some…interesting Christmas decorations at the White House.

ICYMI

► The Washington Post literally illustrates the Mueller Report. It works well.

► A leading Nazi enthusiast in Colorado is living on the public dime.

For more political learnings, check out The Get More Smarter Show or The Get More Smarter Podcast. And don’t forget to give Colorado Pols a thumbs up on Facebook and Twitter.